


Alayne S. and the Mystery Knight

by Siamesa



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV), Girl Genius
Genre: Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Female Friendship, Gaslamp Fantasy, Gen, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Mad Science, Mad Scientists, Tournaments
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-28
Updated: 2017-02-28
Packaged: 2018-09-27 12:25:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10020698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Siamesa/pseuds/Siamesa
Summary: Sansa had been the last and least of the Starks, the first in generations without the Gift.  Even Jon had broken through, and a bastard with the Spark was a dangerous, dangerous thing.Sansa had been weak.  Alayne was simply safe.-Girl Genius fusion.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I've turned down the Jaeger-equivalent accents in this a bit, but they're still present.

_But this isn’t a Stark Story, like your mother tells you by the fire at night.  No howling wolves, no talking castles, no great monster armies of the_ _Wölfe, tearing Others limb from limb._

_Well, not exactly._

_Oh, we all say the Young King will rise again, but right here and now, he’s dead.  The Starks are gone.  Their lands are taken, their machines destroyed, their servants scattered.  Nothing remains but their name._

_At least, that’s what everyone thinks…_

_-_

“It was your mother’s,” Petyr told her.

Sansa looked up at him, eyes wet.  The sewing in her hands was a mess of too-long stitches in patterns she could barely remember making.  She held out her hands for the necklace.

A small, gold pendant, round and thick like a locket (though in the years to come she would never be able to force it open).  A mockingbird was engraved on the front, and – she strained her eyes against the candles to see – what looked like a fish on the back.  A Tully trout.

Petyr had known her mother when they were children.  Had he given this to her?  Had she made it for him?

“Wear it always,” Peter whispered, low in her ear.  His hands came around her to draw it on, fasten it.  “It will protect you.”

_Nothing can protect me,_ she wanted to say, but not to Petyr, not to Petyr who had always been so kind.  She might have whispered it to a father, a sister, a friend, but she had none of those.  She had Petyr, and Ser Dontos, and the air in her lungs.

The world seemed duller, grayer, but that was only the candle sputtering out.  The next morning she could not recall her favorite tune, could not make the sound come to her lips, but that was only one more thing King’s Landing had taken from her.  Her stitching the next day was neat, and perfect, every leaf and flower exactly where she wanted it to go.

She even slept with the pendant tight around her neck.  She slept more often, and she never dreamed.

-

Three Years Later

-

“Alayne!”

Alayne hurried, nearly tripping on another doorframe.  They’d brought the Leaping Tower down from the Eyrie for the tournament, but it had landed… poorly.  The floor was slanted, one of the legs would require a complete overhaul, and none of the gasbags had survived.

“Alayne!”  Myranda popped out of a doorframe, her arms covered with beaded bracelets.  “You _have_ to help me choose!”

Alayne gave her a tired smile.  “Later, ‘Randa.”  She shifted the bags in her arms, as though her friend hadn’t seen them.  “Father needs me to take these down to the tourney grounds.”  And to the stables, and to the great hall, and to the rows of merchant tents.  The purpose wasn’t in the delivery.  The purpose was to be _seen._

Alayne Stone, the Lord Protector’s beautiful daughter, with her long black hair and her deep blue eyes.  _Our poor_ _Harry will fall in love the moment he sees you,_ her father had said.  _They all will._

She’d been a bastard for two years, now.  She’d learned how not to be seen.  But now there was something new in front of her, bright and terrifying.  Harry the Heir, and the knights of the Vale, and a grey cloak with a direwolf – no.  She shut her eyes.

Her head pounded.

The dull ache followed her, down to the grounds and into the stables.  She handed the stablemaster a coil of magnets for his new Patented Construct Detector, and then turned deeper into the rows of barns.  The shortcut would take her to the great hall faster, and right now all she wanted was for this to be over and done.

“Morning, wench.”

She jumped.  The voice had come from behind her, but now she saw another man in front, sliding off of a barrel.  He was short but heavy-chested, and he had a knife.

“Coin, for weary travelers?”  He stepped forward.  Alayne kept her eyes on the knife.

The one behind her wrenched the bag from her hands.  “What’s this, then?”  Cloth fluttered to the ground.  “Rubbish.”

“I have no coin,” Alayne said, keeping her voice even.  “I’m sorry.” _How close are the stablehands?  Who will hear me if I scream?_

“No coin?”  A heavy hand on her shoulder.  “Pity, that, but-”

“Maro!”  The man in front stepped forward, knife held out awkwardly.  “Just take the bag and go.  I’m not getting thrown out the bloody moon door because _you_ can’t-”

Alayne seized her chance, kicking back.  Maro stumbled, and Alayne darted for freedom, legs tangling in her skirts.  Fingers at her neck, her shoulder, and suddenly she couldn’t breathe, suddenly she couldn’t see –

The necklace snapped.

Alayne fell.  She landed, hard, on the muddy ground, but she barely felt it.  Around her, the air sparkled.  “ _That was my mother’s!_ _That was my **mother’s** , and I’ll see you __– I’ll see you **hanged** , and **quartered** , and sold for **parts** , __and **then I’ll** – then I’ll – ”  _  A lance of pain shot through her temples.

One of the men was running.  The second was reaching down.  Alayne grabbed for his face, her hands claws, and felt a jolt of electricity.  She pulled back, and he fell into the mud beside her, body smoking.  Alayne stared up.  She felt as though she were breathing ice water, trying to see through the sun, and it took a moment for the haze of colors to settle into the shape of Mya Stone, holding a sparking mule prod.

“Bastards!”  Mya gave the body another jab.  Her short hair was wild around her face.  “Alayne.  Are you alright?”  She shifted her weight, leaning down and holding out one hand.  Alayne felt a twinge of static as she took it, stumbling to her feet.

Bits of gold glittered on the dusty ground.

_Mother.  Mother._    Alayne reached down, blindly, pulling Mya with her.  The largest piece she could find was a spring.  She clutched it tightly, feeling the sharp end dig into her palm.

Stablehands appeared – finally.  Mya barked at them, and tugged Alayne to her feet, her hand warm and solid. 

“C’mon.”

They settled on a small bench by a far gate.  Mules popped their heads out of stalls, a dozen cold black eyes.  Alayne stared down at the blue fabric of her dress, at the drops of blood leaking slowly from her left fist, until Mya pressed something into her other hand.

“Drink this.  Don’t look at me like that.  _Drink.”_

It wasn’t good beer, but at least it was strong.  Alayne coughed at the first swig, then downed a second.

Memories were chasing her, stronger than they had in years.  She’d been _safe._ Alayne Stone was _safe_.  Even Harry, ass though he was, was _safe_.  They might have called him the Heir, but he didn’t even have the Spark.

Joffrey’d had the Spark.

He’d torn rats to pieces and stitched them back together.  He’d built horrible limping things out of axes and knives.  Alayne still had Sansa’s scars in rows down her back.  Every time she’d prayed, _this one will kill him._ Sparks didn’t last long if they were fools.  Sparks rarely lasted long even if they were _smart._ Half of the Targaryen kings had fallen prey to their own inventions.

Sometimes she’d prayed to break through herself.  It was only a matter of time.  She’d build something, something with fur and claws and teeth, and it wouldn’t matter what they did to her afterwards, because Joffrey would be _dead_.

It had never happened.  Sansa had been the last and least of the Starks, the first in generations without the gift.  Even Jon had broken through, and a bastard with the Spark was a dangerous, dangerous thing.

Sansa had been weak.  Alayne was simply _safe._

-

Mya marched her back up to the Leaping Tower like she might a lost foal, prod at the ready for any more robbers.  Alayne watched the sparks dance off the tip.  _The efficiency of the entire thing could be improved; that was obvious._ _ **If she had** –_

Another throb of pain in her head.  Mya was now watching with obvious concern, but Alayne waved her off at the door.  There were guards here, her father’s men.  She would be safe.

“Thank you,” she said, but it was the wrong voice.  A lady’s voice, and not a friend’s.  Mya raised the prod in an awkward salute, and turned away.

Her father was nowhere in evidence, but she was scheduled to meet him in his solar just before noon.  The first rounds of jousting would take up the entire afternoon and evening, and he would want her to know the competitors, every lord’s son and hedge knight, their histories and weaknesses.  Why they were here, who they served – and who they’d served during the war.

A test.  But she was _good_ at his tests.

The wall clock revealed that it was only half past nine, which meant she had time to dress and do her hair.  She knew that she ought to find her father _now,_ and tell him about the attack and the necklace, but something in her recoiled.  She needed to _plan_ what she’d say to him after a failure like that.

-

“This one.”  Myranda triumphantly held up the necklace.  Twists of gold held three emeralds the color of deep water. 

“I can’t.” The necklace could have graced the royal court.  It was much too fine a thing for Myranda to loan her.  “I’m a _bastard,_ ‘Randa.  Lord Hardyng already thinks I’m upjumping my station.”

“Harry,” said Myranda, “thinks you’re beautiful, and he’ll think it more if he sees you in this.  By far the best thing my dear departed husband ever gave me.”  Her eyes narrowed in thought.  “Wear it with the new dress, the dark one with the postilion waist.” 

Myranda at close range had an almost Spark-like authority about her, impossible to disobey.  Alayne, defeated, lowered her head for Myranda to fasten the necklace. 

Even with the weight of the emeralds, it was light, too light.

“ _There,”_ said Myranda, patting her shoulder.  “It’ll all work out in the end.  Your father will catch those bas—those ruffians, and he’ll have them hanged.  The one Mya killed is on a spike as we speak, I’ve no doubt.”  Seeing the dark look in Alayne’s eyes, she sought another distraction.  “Now, for the matter of my bracelets…  This one was my favorite, but it broke.”

Restringing the bracelet was easy enough, and it gave Alayne something to focus on.  White bead after black, again and again, a hanging bit of crystal every fifth bead.

“Alayne?”

She looked up.  Myranda’s face was scrunched.  “What is it?”

“Nothing, nothing…”  Narrowed eyes again, the look Myranda got when her shallow mask began to drop and she was truly _thinking._ “You were just… humming.  Humming oddly.”

And she could feel it, somewhere in the depths of her throat.  _I remember the song._

-

She had played and replayed in her mind what she would say to her father.  She had no doubt that he knew about the attack already; she could merely give him a few more details about her place in it.  He would worry, perhaps – he would kiss her, hands tight on her arms like he was terrified to ever let her go.  She shrunk back at the thought.  She had tried to make his hands just one more part of this new reality, one more truth of Alayne Stone, but instead they were cracks in the mask, bigger now than ever.

He had his back to her, trying to reorganize his notebooks.  The Leaping Tower was unkind to shelving. 

“Father?”  She kept her hands locked, tightly, behind her back.  Even through Myranda’s calfskin gloves, she could feel the spring from the locket biting into her skin. 

“Alayne!”  He turned around lightly, looking as much of a harried mess as he was capable of.  The top buttons on his vest were uneven, and Alayne moved instinctively forward to fix them before remembering what she held in her hand.

“Father,” she started again.

“Lord Royce informed me that he would send _twenty_ of his household knights.  Twenty, and so of course he’s here with forty and himself.”

“You said that was likely to happen.”

He ran a hand absently along the line of her shoulder.  “So I did.”  He smiled.  “Now, before we must rush out, can you name me the twelve last of our hedge knights?”

“Ser Giles, a golden clockwheel on red.  Ser Morren, a magpie on green.  Ser…”

They left the Leaping Tower, out the Silver Door, into a landscape transformed in the few hours she’d spent cloistered with Myranda. 

“…Ser Yonneth, a silver lightning bolt on white.  Ser…”

Bright flags hung everywhere.  Men, women, and constructs hawked wares from as close as Gulltown and as far as Dorne.  The stands and lists were as bright and beautiful as they’d been –

She stopped, her eyes shut.  _No.  I won’t remember.  I won’t._   Why was it all coming back?

_As they been once, with her father beside her, the Knight of Flowers on his mare, blood and screaming and Sandor Clegane, she could see it through thick glass, **waiting** for her –_

“Alayne!”  Her father pushed her forwards, into a pavilion, and she retained just enough of her balance to curtsy for the man inside.

“Lord Harry.”  She tried to remember what smile he wanted.

“Well, if you call me such, then I must _insist_ you are the Lady Alayne.”  All courtesy.  It didn’t reach his eyes.

It didn’t _need to._   Harry was a tool to be used, not a hero she might love.  She let him pull her out of her curtsy, let him keep her hand in his.  Her other was tight around the skirt of her dress, tight around the spring.

“Alayne!”  It started as a yell, but pulled back into a strangled hiss.  “Alayne – Lord Hardyng, might I speak to my daughter?”

“Of what?”

Petyr had miscalculated.  Harry tried to step between him and Alayne, temper raised.

“Your necklace.”  Her father tried to keep his voice level.  She could tell that he was straining, but she doubted the same was true of Harry, who took a step back, his posture loose and unconcerned.

“It was taken,” she said.  “The bandits.  You recall, I was unharmed - Mya chased them off, but not before they had taken my purse and gold.”  The last sentence was for Harry.  He should have no cause to doubt his lady’s virtue, and no cause to go haring off in revenge.  She thought him far more likely to follow the former path than the latter, but there was always the unpleasant chance he’d do both.

“ _Your necklace._ How could you be such a fool, Alayne?”

“My lord!  Your daughter is unharmed.”  Harry puffed himself up like a rooster.  “Be glad of that.  And as for necklaces, _Lady_ Alayne, I quite prefer the one you wear today.  May I?”

She lifted it up towards him to forestall any attempt he might make at her breasts beneath it.  He twisted the emeralds around to catch the light.

“So dark, it’s almost blue.”  He smiled.  “ _I_ would have given you sapphires, for your eyes, but I fear a lesser gift must suffice.”

With a flourish, he pulled a tangle of rods and wires from a pocket deep in his coat.  Harry flicked his thumb, and the tangle twisted and clicked, shuddering into the shape of a golden, silver-thorned rose.  Alayne took it cautiously by the stem.

It was a little thing.  She’d seen roses like this by the hundreds when the Tyrells came to King’s Landing.  _Alayne,_ she had to remind herself, hadn’t.  Alayne would still be thrilled and awed by anything like this, thinking it so clever that it might be magic.

“My thanks.”  She twisted the rose in her hands, watching how the petals fit together.  Petyr’s hand was nearly painful on her shoulder.

“My favor,” she remembered.  “You would do me honor if you wore it –“

Petyr’s grip tightened further.  “I think it might please the common folk if you were to present your favor to Lord Hardyng where they might see.”

She smiled, weakly, shyly at Harry.  “If Lord Hardying would accept –”

“Of course.”  His hand, now, was on her other shoulder, grip nearly as tight as Petyr’s.  She’d have bruises come tomorrow if they didn’t stop soon.

“Come,” said Harry.  “Let’s greet the Vale.”

-

Sweetrobin was already in the royal box, the implant that protected him from his fits disguised as part of an elaborate cap, lined with fur and shot through with gold.  Between that and his mantle and coat, his pale face was nearly swallowed.  He smiled to see Alayne, but his gaze soured as it turned on Harry, walking tightly by her side.

“My lord.”  Alayne curtsied to Sweetrobin.  Giving Harry her favor now would likely send the poor child into one of his black moods, rage and fits and fear that could last for days.  She looked at the cap, and tried to tell herself again that the implant made them better, not worse.

She had no choice.  She smiled at Harry, and held out an embroidered handkerchief.

“My lady honors me,” he said.  She had gone from bastard to lady in the space of two days, and she ought to feel honored herself.

_But she was not a bastard, she was_ _**Sansa Stark,** the _ _blood_ _of_ _**Winterfell,** _ _and these little_ **_Southron_ ** _**worms** –_

Her head throbbed.  She grabbed a wooden pillar with both hands, trying to steady herself.

Harry was preoccupied in tying the cloth around his arm without ruining the line of his coat, and Petyr was deep in conversation with one of the stewards.  Only Sweetrobin watched her, his eyes wide, as she fought to get her heart and lungs back under control.

She narrowed her eyes, counting to herself, naming the lords and sigils of every knight on the edge of the ring.  That had always calmed her in the Red Keep.

She’d had headaches so often there, in the first years.  Until Petyr.  Everything had hurt until Petyr.

One of the knights was staring at her, eyes mere glints behind his helm.  She held the gaze a moment too long, until he looked away.

“…And that will be another problem,” said Petyr, his voice low and tight.  “Get Ollyn on it.”  The steward nodded. The flags fluttered.  Harry picked idly at his coat.

“ _Alayne,”_ said Sweetrobin, waving his arm and nearly hitting one of the servants.  “Sit over here.”  He thumped a fist on the chair to his left, away from Harry.  Alayne gathered up her skirts, and sat.

He grabbed her sleeve tightly with one clammy hand, pulling her in to whisper at her ear.  “You had a fit, didn’t you?  I saw.”

She shook her head.  “Of course not.”  She couldn’t have looked that badly.  Someone would have noticed.  Even Harry would have said something had she started twitching and collapsed.  “You don’t need to worry, my lord.  It was a headache, that’s all.”

He didn’t let go of her sleeve.  “I won’t let them have you.”

“I know, my lord.”  There was nothing to do but to comfort him.  “I trust you.”

Petyr’s hand on her shoulder interrupted them.  “I must borrow my daughter, Lord Arryn.”  He’d pulled her out of her seat before he finished the sentence. 

“Alayne!  Come back before it starts!”  Even “Lord Arryn” rarely dared to order her father.  She bobbed Sweetrobin an awkward curtsy before following her fath – _Littlefinger,_ _Baelish,_ _Traitor! –_ before following her father.  Her vision swam, and she kept her eyes glued to the back of his coat.

She stood quietly beside him while he welcomed a delegation of knights from Gulltown – a hedge knight, that one, that one a Riverlander, that one a merchant’s son who bought a squireship with gold – and more quietly still as a line of Royce men passed them.  Finally came another of her father’s men, Ollyn, his green eyes narrowed.

“I’ve found our mystery knight,” he hissed, flicking his gaze back towards the retreating Royces, and then over Alayne.  “But the first attempt –”  He shifted, uncomfortable.

“There are three mystery knights,” Alayne said, confused.  The Corbray man-at-arms, a younger Gulltown Arryn, and a seven-foot farmer’s son with some skill at the lance.  Each of them had been quite carefully selected.

“Well,” said Ollyn scornfully, “we have a fourth.”  He shifted his posture towards her father, using his shoulder to cut her off.  “Lord Baelish –”

“A moment, Ollyn.”  Her father touched her elbow. 

“Alayne, sweetling, return to Lord Arryn before he misses you too dearly.”  His eyes were narrowed, both at Ollyn and at a clump of men to their left, and she knew there were times a bastard daughter was wanted out of the way, _away from those who scorned her, **away from**_ ** _those_ _who_ _KNEW_** _ **her** –_

Her head throbbed as she returned to her seat, and she was glad of Sweetrobin’s silence.  Harry had already left, to see that the last polish was on his armor and the best banners on his lance and horse.  Sweetrobin would be introduced as Lord Arryn, but Harry would be the one who looked the part.

Her eyes flickered over again to the knight who’d been staring at her, and she knew she’d found the fourth mystery knight.  His shield was rough, the paint peeling, showing wood gone to silver.  Its only markings were in a dark, brownish red – the rough shape of a face.

He was a Southron, of course, he had to be.  It wasn’t a weirwood face.  But still –

She watched the knight argue with a groom over the state of his horse.   He was short, but well built.  Bits of rough, bristly beard showed from beneath his ill-fitting helmet.  His armor was a hedge knight’s hodgepodge, chain and steel and leather, and she had been a child, just a stupid child, when _her_ _father’s_ _men_ had marched to war.  It might, it might not, be Northern make.

But if one of Robb’s men lived – then he was her man now.  Her responsibility.  She felt her blood run cold as Sansa Stark struggled to break free.  _Robb,_ in her last summer snow, younger then than she was now –

“Lord Arryn,” she said, and Sweetrobin looked up at her.  “I have an idea.”  She swallowed firmly, leaning over his chair and pointing unobtrusively across the lists.  “See that knight?”

He squinted.  “His armor isn’t nice.”

“That’s because he’s a mystery knight, my lord.  He could be anyone, from a lord to a clever peasant.”

“Like Duncan the Tall!”  This earned her his first real smile of the day.

“Exactly, my lord.  The people love mystery knights.  You should show him your favor.  Give him a token.”

Sweetrobin settled back into his chair.  “ _Ladies_ give favors.”  He looked at her, eyes still squinted, then scowled past her to where Harry would sit.

Alayne elected to head that one off at the pass.  “What a splendid idea, my lord!”  It twisted something in her, deep inside, to treat Sweetrobin like Joffrey, _Joffrey,_ _ **Joffrey** who she should __reanimate_ _just to_ ** _rip_** _ **apart** with her __bare_ _ **claws** –_

She waved off Sweetrobin’s look of concern, and clutched at her temples.  The pain was less this time.  She could do this.  She could bear it.

“Call him over,” she said, sweetly, pulling a ribbon from her hair, “and I’ll give him mine.”

The knight followed Sweetrobin’s guard over to the royal booth reluctantly, dragging his feet.  He did not remove his helmet, but up close, she could see that his ill-kempt beard was gray and his eyes so pale a brown that they were nearly gold.  The rest of his face was hidden completely.

“A token, brave ser.”  She leant in, closer, half out of the box, and made to tie the ribbon around his arm herself.  “They mean to kill you,” she hissed.  _The first attempt,_ Ollyn had said.  Her father had planned this tournament down to the last man, had more than likely found a way to choose a winner, and he would not tolerate any piece that did not fit.

The knight’s posture shifted, barely.  “Do they?”  His voice was a rough growl.  Suddenly, his head tilted back, and he breathed in sharply, one, twice, like an animal sniffing the air.  “ _Lady._ ”

“I am no lady, ser,” she said, head throbbing once more.  “I am but Lord Baelish’s natural daughter.” Her fingers fumbled with the knot.

“Oho.”  This time it was more a breath than a growl.  “I see.”  The knight stepped back, adjusting his pauldrons. 

“So, they vant to kill me, _Baelish girl._   They may try.”  He bowed, roughly, and walked back towards his horse.

Alayne returned to her seat, with scarce a nod for Sweetrobin.  She _knew_ _that_ _voice – **no**.  _ Another girl had known that voice, long ago.  Another girl had known the songs of the Wölfe. 

-

The jousting seemed to pass in a haze.  Alayne tried to keep her aching head steady as knight after knight took to the lists; by the third pair, she’d given up any attempt to recognize them by name or house.  Her father would be disappointed, but that, too, was dull and distant.

Sweetrobin, beside her, nudged her arm.  “It’s our knight!” he hissed.  “Is he wearing your favor?”

Alayne squinted out.  The sun was too bright, the colors washed out and dull.  “There he is, my lord,” she said, softly.  The Northern knight rode a shaggy horse, as short and stocky as himself.  His opponent wore the black and red of a Corbray householder.

Jousting was an old-fashioned thing.  Lances were wood, shields were steel, and bringing in a construct in place of a horse meant disqualification and a hefty fine.  Many people favored it for that; then again, many people feared Sparks.  Alayne, sitting here, watching the knights prepare, might have been some Northern maid before the conquest, come down to the Vale in the King of Winter’s court.

She hummed, softly.

And then the knights clashed.

Alayne could see that the Corbray man had aimed his lance poorly and low; the Northern knight and his horse skidded out of the way, nearly losing their balance.  Both men pulled back, then ran at each other again, the Northman kicking his horse forward with a whoop that even Sweetrobin could hear.

“The mystery knight!” he called, clapping.  “Forward the – ”

The riders met with a spray of blood.

Alayne was nearly leaning out of the box again, her hands white on the railing.  The Northman pulled himself free of his fallen horse, holding his splintered lance like a club.

“Bänder,”he bellowed.  The horse’s legs were twitching, and blood spewed from his breast.  Around her, the crowd murmured.  “Bänder,” said the knight again, softer.  “Rest now.”  He pushed the splintered lance down, and the horse stilled.

The Corbray man’s horse was unharmed, but the man himself had hit the ground hard.  When he stumbled to his feet, there was a dagger in his hand.

“Ho,” said the Northman.  “So you vant a _real_ fight.”  The visor on his helm had half fallen, and in the midst of his beard, Alayne saw a sharp-toothed grin.

And for a moment, she was somewhere else, somewhere else entirely, a high-roofed hall, the floor warm beneath her feet.

_“Und so the Wölfe pledge to the Starks.  By ice und fire, by blood und iron und steel.  Und so it vas for Brandon, so it vill be.  For Eddard.  For Robb.”_

_Her father, her_ true _father, warm and safe beside her, bowed his head.  “And so the Starks pledge to the Wölfe.  Forever.”_

_“Forever,” echoed Robb, but suddenly it was Sansa who stood in his place, Sansa who met the yellow eyes, who shook the clawed hand._

“What are you doing?”  came another voice, closer, breaking Sansa back into the world around her.  “Fire, you fools!  Fire – ”

_“ **Stop.** ”_

Sansa stood, straight and proud, her hands shaking.  _“ **Stop,** ” _she repeated, but there was no need of it.  Around her, the crowds stood perfectly still, staring at her with dull eyes.  The Corbray knight was frozen completely, his dagger still outstretched towards the Northman – no.  Towards the miracle, towards the only one but herself not stopped in their tracks.  Towards the last of the Wölfe.

“Lady Stark.”  No grin now, and a wavering voice.  “Lady Stark.  What vould you haff me do?”

Sansa squeezed her eyes shut.  “Run,” she whispered.  “Run.  Be safe.  _Please.”_

The world wavered around her, and she fell into the black.

-

“What happened?”

She was in her room, slumped on her bed, with the taste of a drug she couldn’t identify on her lips.  Petyr was inches from her face, his own twitching with fury.

“I don’t know,” she said, weakly.  “I don’t… I can’t remember.”  It was all a haze of pain and fog and music.  But there were things he couldn’t know.  Things he mustn’t.  She kept the weakness in her voice as she continued.  “Father,” and the word, suddenly, tasted of bile – “Father, my head hurts.  It hurts so much - ”

“Sweetling,” said Petyr.  “I know.  I understand.  We’ll get you your necklace back – but you must try to remember.”  He sighed.  His face was kind as he kissed her forehead, and with all the courage left in her, she didn’t shrink back.  “Or perhaps… Perhaps it’s better if you don’t.”  His hand rested on her cheek. 

She yawned, the motion pulling her away from Petyr’s hand.  “I’m so tired…”

He kissed her forehead again, perfunctorily.  “We’ll talk again tomorrow, sweetling.”

She watched through heavy-lidded eyes as a guard opened the door for him, and heard the click-click-click of a dozen locks.

A prisoner, then.  But she’d been a prisoner before.  She scanned the room with a mad, bubbling confidence in her chest. Trunks.  _A wardrobe –_ _clothes?_ _ **Rope?** But __the **window** would_ ** _be_ _sealed_** – a trunk, a mirror, a bed. Harry’s necklace.  Harry’s rose.

She removed some of the window-bolts with a twisted hatpin, but there’d be more on the outside, and a three story drop besides.  _Flying?  I_ _need something_ _that_ _flies –_

She opened Harry’s rose, then closed it again, then set to work on it with the hatpin, humming.

Hours may have passed; she didn’t notice.  On the walls, the gaslamps sputtered into life.  Something rattled her window, once, twice.  She carefully placed the spring from her necklace into place beneath the winding key of what had been the rose.  _If_ _ **this** __one_ –

She scarcely noticed the window shutter crashing onto the flagstones beside her.

“Ho!  Lady Stark!”

The mystery knight from the tourney was halfway through her window.

“Leetle – leetle help?  Only didn’t dodge the second beartrap so vell – ”

She let go of the former rose, which whirred to life behind her, and rushed to the window.  Sure enough, one leg was well pierced through.  She could see grey fur and black blood beneath the torn leather.  The Wolfen knight had removed most of his chainmail for the climb, and she helped him scramble into the room easily enough.

The knight settled on the flagstones, and pulled a needle and thread from out of his shirt – _her_ shirt.  The Wölfe were human, before they drank from Brandon’s Spring, and roughly a quarter of those who drank were women.  There had been three in the entourage in King’s Landing.

“My thanks, Lady Stark.” 

Sansa took in a long, slow breath.  “I am not the Lady Stark you want.”

The knight looked her up and down.  “Hyu are the Lady Stark I haff.”  She shook her grey head, sharply, but Sansa could see tears gathering in the yellow eyes.  “That is… _everything.”_   She reached out for Sansa with both her hands, sewing up her wound forgotten.  “ _Ve failed._ Your father.  Your brothers, your sister – ve failed them.  But you are alive!  Und I am yours, Lady Stark.  I vill rip your enemies apart!  I will see hyu back in Winterfell!  _I vill see Winterfell_!”

“I’m sorry,” Sansa said, and now there were tears in her own eyes, unasked for and uncontrolled.  “I’m not – I’m weak.  I’m a coward.  I’m not even a _Spark!”_

“Oho?”  One clawed hand pointed back towards the wardrobe.  “Then vat is that?”

Sansa stared.  The thing that had been the rose shimmered as it continued its wobbly flight around the room.

“Und how I found this tower – you vere humming, Lady Stark.  You vere singing!  You haff the Voice!  Stronger than any I’ve heard since hyu grandmamma!  Didn’t you see them, all those silly Southron knights, frozen in their steps?”

The Voice.  _The song._

The song that had vanished, when Petyr had given her that necklace.  The song that had returned when it was shattered.

Sansa’s fists shook.

“Aha!” said the Wolfen knight, happily.  “Ve have some killing to be done, ya?”

Her first instinct – her only instinct, in the burning red fury that engulfed her – was to say yes, was to grab the wardrobe and batter down the door, rip a man’s throat out and steal his sword, stab Petyr Baelish until he had no more blood to spill, for this, _for this, making her_ _believe she was_ _ **worthless** , __making her believe she was_ _ **nothing** , robbing her_ _of_ _her **birthright** and her __**Spark** and _**_her_** _ **name** -_

“No,” she said, finally, waiting for the lights in front of her eyes to clear.  “First, we escape.”

-

They made it down the side of the Leaping Tower with some difficulty.  The Wolfen knight’s leg was obviously still paining her, but she still half carried Sansa.  They reached solid ground to find the makeshift courtyard near-deserted.  A few guards huddled around a bonfire near the stables; there were more at the wall.

“We need a horse,” said Sansa, pulling her hood down over her head.  “Or two.”

“Horses won’t carry Wölfe,” said the knight.  “Not these little Southron things.”

Sansa narrowed her eyes.  “Then I think I have an idea.”

To all appearances, the creature in the fifth stall was an ordinary piebald mare.  But the Construct Detector had nearly shaken itself apart in the stablemaster’s hands that morning.

“Steel bones,” said Sansa, patting the construct’s proffered nose.  “Three hearts.  Ser Gerrold is likely still drinking away his grief at getting caught.”

Her companion took a long sniff of the mare’s mane.  “Aha.  Avay with the spoils of battle.”

They crept with the mare past a sleeping stablehand, and strapped Bander’s saddlebags to the best-fitting tack they could find.  The construct mare followed Sansa cheerfully, barely needing to be led. 

“I’ll take care of the gate,” said the Wolfen knight as they reached the stable door.  She drew a jagged-edged sword from her belt.  “Only five of them.”

Sansa put out a hand.  “No.”

“ _Five_.  Von’t have time to scream.”

But the sharp-toothed smile was pained, the bear-trap limp heavier.  Sansa’s first glimpse of home in years, her knight, _her_ duty.  It was the oath of the Wölfe to fight and die for Starks.  But alone, in the forest, even if she could make it past the guards – Sansa might as well return to Baelish.

They’d slaughtered the Wölfe in King’s Landing, mowed them down with rows of red-cloaked musketeers.  If she closed her eyes, Sansa could still see the blood.

“No,” she repeated.  “Follow my lead.”

-

Sansa walked straight towards the guards, hands clasped in front of her, swinging a small bag taken from the saddlepacks.  The Wolfen knight followed behind her, hooded in the blue and white livery they’d torn from the wall banners.

“Tommet!” she said, spotting a familiar face among the guards.  “Father sent me out.”

Tommet opened his mouth to answer, but a burlier, unfamiliar guard shoved in front.  “Out?  At night?  For what?”

Another guard laughed, gesturing towards the mare and its rider.  “Out for a night in the trees?  You’d best watch yourself, ser, or her father will feed you your own – ”

Sansa heard a growl behind her, but Tommet had slapped the speaker before anyone could move.  “You shut your mouth about his lordship’s daughter!”

Sansa lowered her head, and tried to will a blush to her face.  “Father sent me to take this to Harry – Lord Hardyng, I mean.”

Sansa could practically hear their thoughts.  A bastard girl, sent to buy Lord Hardyng with her maidenhead.  She waited for one of the flashes of anger that had pushed her all day, but instead she felt only an icy calm.

The guards opened the gate.  Sansa and the Wolfen knight walked slowly through the rows of tents and pavilions.  The tavern glowed with light, and she wondered if Harry was there.  How long it would take Petyr to find her empty room.  If Sweetrobin would miss her at all.

She pulled herself up onto the horse behind her knight, and they rode into the forest.

-

They made camp beside a stream.  The construct mare had barely a sweat for all her galloping, but Sansa was shaking.

The Wolfen knight removed her boots, tearing the seam in her trousers until the bear trap wound was fully visible, a line of red in the gray fur.  She let out a low hiss of breath.  “Deeper than I thought.”

Sansa remembered this.  She had seen her father do it, time and time again, the wounded Wölfe filling the great hall and waiting for a Stark to put them back together.  “Do you have thread?”

“Ya.”

Sansa hummed as she sewed up the wound.  The Wolfen knight made a terrible snorting sound, and it took Sansa a moment to realize she was crying.

“I’m sorry – ”

“No.  Not the wound.  I – _Ve haff a Stark again._ ”  Yellow eyes stared down at Sansa in wonder.  “ _Ve haff a Stark.”_

Sansa took the offered hand, and squeezed it.  “Thank you,” she whispered.  _Thank you for finding me.  Thank you for knowing who I was, when I didn’t.  Thank you._ She blinked tears away from her own eyes.  “I don’t know your name,” she said, searching for something that wouldn’t make her voice crack.

“Ah!” said the knight, recovering.  “I am Gräfin Adelsinda Emnilda Marlein Heske Willburna Reglindis von Schnee.”  She tilted her head back.  In the pale fur of her neck was a long, stitched scar.  “Vhen you were young, you used to call me Lady.”


End file.
